August 21, 2009

Ah, where would we be without our beloved coal and oil industries stirring up more BS. In case you need a recap, the oil companies’ plans to stage a bunch of fake rallies all over the country against climate legislation got uncovered, and the coal companies have had a scandal with forged interest group letters that had gotten better, and better, and better, and better….and better. Wow.

So, now the coal industry has dropped Bonner over the fake letters to try and save face. Brad Johnson over at Wonk Room calls them out nicely when big coal insists it did nothing wrong.

“In fact, ACCCE covered up the fraud and is now throwing Bonner under the bus. The coal coalition had been informed by the Hawthorn Group, its primary contractor, days before the pivotal House vote on the energy legislation. But ACCCE kept silent, failing to notify lawmakers or the defrauded organizations. ACCCE continues to employ the Hawthorn Group and the notorious voter-fraud company Lincoln Strategy Group.”

So that’s coal. Now the American Petroleum Institute has started holding their fake “Energy Citizen” rallies over the US. They clearly have the finances to fund these rallies, as it recently surfaced they spent $1.9 million dollars in just the 2nd quarter of 2009 on lobbying, up a million from last year. So how do we know the rallies are fake? Public Citizen Texas managed to sneak into the rally, and they have excellent reports and video here, here, and here. Check out this small snippet from Sarah McDonald’s report

“This was such a fake, Astroturf event that they didn’t know how to handle legitimate grassroots support. A couple of women who had been to some of the teabagger events and townhalls came down, armed with American flags and excited to protest “crap and tax” — but even THEY weren’t allowed in. Several others who had heard about the rally through Freedom Works, on right wing radio, or in the paper were also locked out.”